Okay, because of the nature of this post I just want to establish a few things first;
* All the firearms mentioned in this post are totally legal and the owners hold firearms certificates for them
* All shooting was done in a safe and sensible way by experienced people on private land
* No laws were broken and no animals were harmed.
Right, now that has been established then we can continue.
The other day I spent a morning, as you do, watching friends firing an M16 and other firearms. Actually, it was an armalite (the civvy version of the rifle) and to be even more precise a modified AR-15.
Obviously I don’t really do this sort of thing often. It was rather enjoyable though, watching these guns go off, but was also very frightening when you realise the power behind a bullet. From 100 yards, a single round will make a brick explode. Nothing is left - just the debris. The force is incredibly powerful. So then I stopped to think about what it would do to a living thing… which brings me on to the point of this post…
Watching Big Brother the other night I was utterly disgusted at the way that repugnant girl Alexandra DeGale was talking about what a big Gangsta she and her friends are and how she will be waiting for the others to come out. “Remember that I told you” was one of her favourite sayings, darkly intimating as to what was going to happen to other contestants at the hands of her “Strong… solid, So Solid men…” and then going ‘pow pow pow’ and pointing her finger about.
I have seen this behaviour before on TV, silly little girls glamourising guns and rappers and giving it the pointed finger gun gesture as if it’s cool. What exactly is cool about this? For a start, rap artists glamourise treating women like bits of meat and making money from other peoples misery. Secondly, most of them are not ‘Gangsta’s’ anyway are they? It’s just a load of marketing hype to sell their CD’s to middle-class suburban schoolboys. Its so stale now to be honest and I am glad it is disappearing from public life as 99% of it was crap.
I struggle to find the words to express how crass this girl is; with her pathetic talk of harrassing other contestants and having them shot. I wonder just how she would react if she could really see what happens to a human being when a bullet hits them. I somehow doubt it would be the tough-faced braggadocio she so keenly expressed on Big Brother; I suspect she would be shocked and sickened. Perhaps that’s what these people need - to shake the ignorantly glamorous image of guns out of their heads and to see firearms for what they really are. However, Alexandra seems defiant and, incredibly, denies she has done anything wrong. All I can say really is that she needs to try and educate herself a bit more and GROW THE FUCK UP.
After being excited at the first new series of Dr Who coming to BBC1 in years (I am going back a bit here… when Christopher Ecclestone was the first ‘new’ Dr Who), my mouth has slowly developed a nasty, bitter taste whenever I sit down to watch it. It all started off so well - Ecclestone was a great Doctor Who and the first episode with the animated dummies was cracking. As were many of that series - like the one with Simon Pegg and the Jagrafess or the episode with the time paradox in it (okay, so not hugely original I guess but it was done well apart from the gigantic flying holly leaves that everyone was scared of. But I can’t entirely pin that on RTD) I mean I even tolerated the epicene Jack Harkness and his cod manliness. Even more than that, when Ecclestone fled the series (I wonder why - was it really, as he said, because he didn’t want to get typecast, or was it perhaps because he smelt the reek of the second series wafting towards him) and was replaced by David Tenant my immediate reaction was to turn over in disgust and vow never to watch Dr. Who again. ‘How can anyone replace Chris Ecclestone now? He was fantastic and the perfect Doctor’ I thought, but decided to give it a go as Tenant had played a good part in Foyles War (a favourite of mine written by Anthony Horowitz - take note RTD). Tenant has done a fantastic job; I look at Ecclestones Who now and think it a little cold and aggressive. Tenant rules! But- on to my point.
Am I the only one who has noticed how many guff-awful episodes there are now? I mean, come on. There have been so many dreadful episodes now that I forget most of them and show little interest in seeing them to the end. Like the one with the Doctor’s daughter in it for instance - full of glaring plot holes, bewildered looking fish head soldiers, acne infested gawky teenagers and a corny plot line held together with one of Russel’s soggy semen-spattered wank tissues. And now it looks like he has a daughter roaming the universe that he doesn’t know about (The Doctor that is - not RTD who I don’t think has any children?). I groaned out loud as that episode started and could see the corny ending racing toward me in double quick time. Please God, don’t let it become a spin-off, don’t let it become a spin off…. like that, that… what was it called? The one where they dug up one of the old Doctors Assistants? It doesn’t matter, it was beyond bad. It was probably put down like the grotesque mutant that it was (Hopefully buries alongside ‘Rose Tyler: Earth Defence’). Its like RTD pushes the contents of a scrabble board up his backside, pops up to see the head of programming, and sprays letter squares out all over his big, shiny mahogany desk. “Fantastic Russell, here’s a cheque for £3 Million”.
Am I the only one who thinks that they could, perhaps, do better? The last episode I really enjoyed was the one which was set just before the Great War. A 2 parter, it was thoroughly entertaining and involving and left me with a tear in my eye at the end. And guess what? It wasn’t written by RTD. I think he was too busy writing a spin off about K9’s radar ears being teleported back in time to the start of the Second World War and becoming a radar chain station along the south coast.
So come on, you know you don’t want to admit that Doctor Who is bloody awful, and we all love Mr Tenant, but those plots…. ***wince*** You can fool some of the people all of the time…
rating: 4/10
Robsa
PS I hear that there is to be a new spin-off series out next spring where Sylvester McCoy’s brain is transplanted inside a BBC Micro model ‘B’ home computer attached to pram wheels which goes around investigating murders in swimming pools owned by homosexual TV entertainers. Can’t wait. Awight?
